At first blush, it’s unclear what Phil Lynott has to do with Badger Clark—let alone the Black Hills. But, give me a moment.
Badger Clark was named South Dakota’s Poet Laureate by Governor Leslie Jensen in 1937. He achieved modest literary notoriety with the poem “A Cowboy’s Prayer,” in which he ruminates about a transcendental life on the lonesome prairie. He asks: “Make me was big and open as the plains, / As honest as the hawse between my knees / …Free as the hawk that circles down the breeze!” Not bad.
And then there’s Phil Lynott, rock star front man for the Irish band Thin Lizzy. Lynott reached international fame with 1976’s “The Boys Are Back in Town,” in which he ruminates mostly about impending wanton debauchery at a place owned by a guy named “Dino.” While his “Gaelic soul” is a critical favorite, his poetic sensibilities are, at times, well, neerdowell; he once sang, “I’m a rocker. I get my rock n’ roll from the rock n’ roll store.”
Okay, so Badger Clark and Phil Lynott aren’t close—take my word for it, the dissimilarities only continue from here. But there is a link between these two giants. And predictably, it involves Deadwood.
A couple hours’ drive north of where Badger Clark’s home rests in Custer State Park sits the Tin Lizzie Casino. Now there’s really no good reason for an Irish rock band from the 70s to be the inspiration for the nomenclature of a Deadwood casino. I’ve wondered if the name is meant as an ode to the many Irish immigrants who headed west to sniff out gold claims in the Hills. But, frankly, most of the Irish were likely heavily assimilated into the cultural bedrock by the time Lizzy emerged (approximately 100 years later) on the American scene with its twin-guitar attack and masculine, hard-charging alternative to disco.
Furthermore, there appears to be ample supply of classic rock bands from Lizzy’s era with equally pun-worthy names. Why not Bachman-Turner Jackpot? Or Jethro Till? Or Crosby, Stills, and Craps?
The mystery behind the Tin Lizzie Casino has resisted explanation—that is until an answer came to me. An answer, mind you, that has a lot to do with South Dakota’s Original Poet Laureate.
A couple nights ago, while enjoying a local FM station, I was reacquainted with “Cowboy Song,” a Lizzy deep cut. Now, let’s be fair; Lynott plays loose with geography in the tune singing about “running free with the buffalo” while he’s “bustin’ broncs in Mexico.” It’s not the absurd historical perversion that is Billy Joel’s just-stumbled-upon-the-Wild-West-as-a-great-metaphor-for-being-a-rock-star anthem, “The Ballad of Billy the Kid.” But suffice to say one assumes Lynott has never ridden a horse.
Still, Lynott is forgiven because he admits right off the bat what the song is really about when he wails, “Lord, I’m just thinkin’ bout a certain female.” It’s inevitable and trite, but he gains points for simply coming out and saying it.
What really caught me off-guard in “Cowboy Song,” however, was Lynott’s chorus: “Roll me over and turn me around/ Let me keep spinning till I hit the ground.” This is where I leaned in to crank the volume. What grabbed my ear is what should call to attention most Badger Clark enthusiasts. In “A Cowboy’s Prayer,” published in 1906, Clark calls out for guidance near the poem’s end: “Right me, sometimes, when I turn aside / …And guide me on the long, dim, trail ahead.”
It struck me with amazement: the verb “to turn,” as in to fix someone when they feel broken, is used in both Lynott’s rock n’ roll ballad and in Clark’s meditative poem. And it seems Lynott’s song, for all of its random hodgepodge of cowboy imagery, seems to have nailed the essence of the Cowboy Life. Whether a leather jacket-clad bar-hopping rock n’ roll front man or a contemplative cowpoke under a canopy of western stars, a cowboy always has to have at least this one thing: rugged resilience.
Which brings me back to the Tin Lizzie Casino. In my estimation, I think—and owner of Tin Lizzie if you’re out there reading this, correct me if I’m wrong—that the Tin Lizzie Casino is actually a memorial to the rock band Thin Lizzy and its “Cowboy Song.” Of course, there is the distinct possibility that the name just sounds cool. But, that seems far too convenient and doesn’t give us the excuse to mention Badger Clark and Phil Lynott in the same sentence—which could be a Rock Garden Tour First.
Next week the Revolution talks about 1980s singer/songwriter Christopher Cross and his connections to the Burbank Yacht Club.
The Revolution will not be undersold at the rock n’ roll store.
Cousin Christopher tickles keys with the Golden Bubbles (they drive to most of their gigs in a white limo). He also plays with the Rock Garden Tour Family Band, and teaches college kids how to write good.
